ChrisH

Yes that might be true. Also, LED triggers are still a relatively new product to underwater photography standards and maybe existing issues will be or have already been fixed in recent generations. My point regarding the strobes is: having options and a possible back up is a nice feature for some and a key feature for others. With prices going up, the Retras might have to stand against strobes that do have those features and be of interest for people that need or demand those things at that price range.

It was a UWTechnics Trigger 😬🫣 (for my Isotta Housing). I have to say it worked mostly without problems, but sometimes it would stop working during the dive just to start working after the dive again. Sometimes new batteries were suddenly dead in two days, so I had to constantly check. I hab two trips during which I changed to the pop up flash of the D810, just to be „safe“ because I got the impression I could not trust the LED trigger enough. But it seem to me that LED triggers in general (all brands) are the weakest point at the moment of all underwater camera systems when it comes to reliability. Having a back up solution should be considered, especially for once-in-a-lifetime-trips…

Yes, exactly! The better the strobe the more the diffusor is an option rather than a necessity! If the strobe has really good quality of light, you might find yourself using the diffusors only for special applications like CFWA and leaving them on land most of the time. Actually I don't even own diffusors for my Seacams and used them on the Retras only to get warmer color temperature. In your test shots, I think you can clearly see the Ikelite just lighting up the whole scene overall quite nice and even and other strobes having a much harder "fall off" towards the edges (floor, plant and the picture on the wall). Based on this test shots, the Ikelite would be my preferred one. EDIT: sorry for OT!

Yes, that is true. However, with better quality of light you will find it much easier to produce good results right away. And having the benefit of being able to further improve the image in post processing rather than having to "fix" it also really makes a difference in my opinion. As stated before in different topics, my main goal would always be to get the strobe with the best quality of light (wide even beam, warm color temperature). At least for my shooting style. Technical data doesn't give the real picture of the performance of a strobe. So I really appreciate that you are testing the strobes! Regarding the Retras: I had the first version with the round flash tube (the first Retra Pro model I think) and was really pleased with the quality of light I would get from the strobes. They were eating batteries, but back then there was no real competiton in their price range (regarding the quality of light). With the latest prices they will get more into the high end territory, like the Seacams. I found the Seacams a bit better (for me), but they are still more expensive than the Retras. However one thing I noticed: the Retras only offer optical triggering. You can buy an adaptor to use sync cables. But without that additional piece (with its own batteries in it!), you can only trigger them via optical cables. Maybe it is just me, but I found the LED triggers to be the most unreliable part of recent equipment for underwater use. And I hear from a lot of people having problems with the LED triggers and also there are often reports about problems in forums. I had several times failure of my LED trigger, leading to dives with not pictures. Fortunately my old Nikon D810 had the backup built in: a pop up flash. But none of the newer camera bodies has that "backup feature" anymore. Yet it seems that optical triggering is becoming the new standard... so it might just be that there is not enough demand for using sync chords anymore and Retra has decided to cut on this and just went for the optical route. But then again, with increased prices, they get in other territories, with Seacam D160 and OneUW 160 offering sync chord as well as optical triggering, giving you both options and a backup if needed. I just use sync cables now and haven't had any issues since then.

I have no experience with the Trioplan lenses on MFT, but if you want to find out for yourself, you might want to consider the TTArtisan copy of the Trioplan lens: https://www.ttartisan.com/?list_9/185.html I bought one and use it on a full frame camera. It is much (much!) cheaper than the new Trioplan and might be an option, as those lenses are a very special and difficult to use underwater. Being fully manual and having not the best image quality anyway, I don't think the TTArtisan copy is worse than the original. At least it can create the bubble bokeh effect. Given the price difference, it was a no-brainer for me. But I think there is only the 100mm version, at least I have not found the 50mm from TTArtisan.

I try to avoid adapters, too. They introduce another possible point of failure. But the Sony to Canon adapters are around for some time now and are used by many underwater photographers. It seems there are no problems with those adapters, at least I did not hear about them being unreliable. So I think that would be no point of concern any more (for me). Regarding the wetness and split level shots: - the front element of the wet lenses tend to be very small; that makes it difficult for split shots, as a bigger Dome will help a lot - wet lenses tend to have a smaller depth of field; but depth of field is crucial for split shots, as you focus on the part underwater and need the depth of field to get the part over water into focus

Haha, you‘re welcome 😬 Just let me know if you need more „help“ with spending money on underwater photography equipment, you can always count on me! 🥳

Another vote for the external viewfinder from me 😉 Especially if you shoot a lot of macro, you might find it is one of the best tools you ever bought! I have seen a lot of people buy one, and none of them would give it away. The angled viewfinder takes some dives to get used to, but once you have been through the initial frustration in using it, you might find yourself wondering how/why you have been shooting without it before. I know they are expensive and seem at first not to add that much benefit, rather than being a "nice-to-have" piece. But they will outlast a lot of camera/housing upgrades in the future and it is a really essential piece of gear in my opinion. Even more so know with the EVFs and their ability to let you review the pictures in the EVF and see critical focus for the macro shots or the focus peaking feature. It upgrades the whole setup more than the cost of it (10%?).

Ah, I should have explained it a little bit more: The glue on my dome had been compromised from age or wrong storage (manufacturer or dealer). You could see water „soaking in“ a little bit on one single point from the outside, almost till under the glas. But there was no leak at that point, potentially because the o-ring in the dome blocked it. But if you take the dome underwater the pressure might be enough to let some drops of water inside the housing. The vacuum won‘t get it as there is no „leak“ at the surface. If you leave it in the bathtub for a longer period of time and inspect the dome, you might be able to spot such spots, where the water got almost inside the dome and could cause a leak when under pressure underwater. It is hard to explain what it looked like and unfortunatly I didn‘t take a picture. But I was able to see the spot that caused the leak, even if there was no leak at the surface!

Mine did not 😉 I usually kept my vacuum also over night. And it didn't get the leak in the dome. I suspect it was not a "constant" leak like a hair or grain on a o-ring. That is why I suggested to test it in the bathtub also overnight. Or maybe just do both 😉 Better safe than sorry...

I don't know about the 2x TC, but Seacam has a dedicated zoom gear for the 1.4x TC from Kenko with the fisheye lenses. That is what I use if I do need more flexibility. But the TC also introduces a hit in the image quality: it tends to work not as good when shooting against the sun and will introduce more flare. Other than that, I find the image quality to be fine for me.

Thank you, that is interesting! Never considered a Loupdeck, I only knew them for audio mixing! Will have to have a look at them!

Those are all good points! I just wanted to add that a better quality of light (wide even beam, color temperature) does not make a picture better per se. It just makes it easier to get good lighting in the pictures from my experience. My older strobes were much more prone to give hotspots, so I had to move them around more often, correcting the position a bit here, then again and again after that. The better the strobe, the more "forgiving" it is: You just have to spend less time with strobe positioning and post processing. Also for myself I found it hard to get the pictures on the same level with post processing, as just getting the shot right in cam and then process from there. So less correcting in post processing, more improving the image in post processing. Also it should be noted that as we get more into High-End stuff, the price to performance ratio decreases rapidly. You will end up paying 2 or 3 times a price for getting maybe 10% more. Which might be worth it for some, but not for others.

I found the iPad and Pencil very convenient for cleaning up backscatter. I just use Air Play from my Mac to share the screen with the iPad, open Photoshop and I can remove all particles very easy. It is much more efficient than using a mouse.

Thank you ver much! 🙏

Yes, exactly! The leak was also not showing up on all dives on that trip. That is why I think it would be beneficial to test it over a longer period of time (couple of hours) in the water (bathtub). you might miss it, if you just ditch it into the water like a quick check before a dive.

I too had a vacuum valve back then and it did not get it! That is why I would recommend doing a test in the bathtub before and leave it there for a couple of hours!

I had used a 3D printed version of a snoot... for about one trip. That kind of might be a hint of how much I liked it 😉 After that I purchased the Retra snoot, and have been set for all those years since then. It starts with the handling: the 3D printed solutions will most likely float. If you want to take it off, it will almost always go to places where you don't want it to be. It was a constant annoyance to me. With the optical snoots, you just clip them away. There is also no contest in aiming the snoot: the optical snoot will be so much easier to aim and that was what immediately sold me to it. Because aiming a snoot is always a challenge, especially while using one for the first couple of dives. If you have a strobe with a focus light in the middle of the strobe and use an optical snoot, it ist much much easier and will give you a lot less frustration. The next thing is flexibility. With the optical snoot you get different light options by just changing the distance of the snoot to the subject. The edge of the light will be very different. You can have it wider with soft edges or very sharp with a hard light fall off, just by altering the distance. Without optical elements in the snoot, I don't think that is possible.

I wouldn't go that far to say it is impossible to get an entire scene in focus, as these shots here are take at really close distances, making it kind of CFWA shots. Also I don't think Nauticam would come up with such an expensive product, if it would be optically flawed like that. Of course we will have to wait and see what other user experiences will be like... But, as I stated before, the shots and reviews so far all suggest in my opinion that unlike the rectilinear wet lenses, the FCP might not introduce optically superior solutions, but rather give you more flexibility. You might not gain any advantages on apertures that you can use, maybe you might be even forced to close aperture more than with a fisheye (we will see on that also with further user experience). But you will have more flexible setup during the dive, which might be worth it for some people.

I once had a problem with an older dome port, that might have been in the store some years before I bought it. I don't think the glass will crack or something like that. But the glue or sealing of the glass to port can get damaged over time. If that is the case, I don't think it will cause catastrophic flooding. I had just moisture and very small drops of water inside the dome. I would just test the housing and the port before the trip without the camera in it, by leaving it in the bathtub or something similar for a couple of hours.

They sell a "universal" fiber optic cable as compatible with the strobe, which does come with support for Inon, Nauticam & Sea & Sea Connectors, so it is not clear which one is for this strobe. Based on the Videos I would guess (!) it is the small Sea&Sea style.

No, the FCP should (and will) be sharp even if shooting at wider aperatures. But I don‘t think it will give you an advantage in depth of field compared to Fisheye lenses, maybe it could have even less. So if you want the background not to be blurred you will have to stop down the same (or maybe more?) than with a normal fisheye lens. If you want/need the whole picture to be sharp is a matter of personal taste and preference but most big wide angle scenes other than shooting fish in the blue are normally shot like landscape over water, with enough depth of field to have the entire picture sharp. So, without having access to a FCP, I would guess (!) that it is indeed different to the WACAP/WWL, where the compromised optics of rectilinear lenses for underwater use are corrected and the goal is better optical performance. The FCP to my impression is more an approach to introduce more flexibility to a fisheye solution, rather then to improve optical performance.

Ah ok, so you did not get any sharp pictures? Yes, then I think there should have been something wrong with the unit you got or the extension. My first guess would be that the wrong extension should have more impact at the edges, but the center of the frame should have been sharp. That is just a guess though. On the other hand, if the extension was too short, maybe the 28-60 could not focus close enough for the FCP to work properly? Did you try different zoom settings?

Yes, the shots in air do not show how the light distribution will be underwater. As water is a diffusor by itself, you will not get those patterns from the YS-D2 or Z330 if you use the strobes underwater. But the water ist the same for all strobes 😉 So strobes that have a nice even beam will benefit from the water the same (or even more?) than the strobes with a narrower or more uneven beam. I think the Retra test shows the differences of the strobes very well. it is not to say that the strobes will give you the light pattern as in air. It is just to have a comparison of the strobes, so you can make an educated guess on what light another strobe will give you compared to the strobe you already own and know. I think it is more complicated to do the same test in water, as you would have to shoot the strobes in total darkness in the swimming pool to not get any (!) light interference. Shooting them in a dark room is much easier.

Yes, you have to shoot them stopped down! At least f13, maybe f16. Don't know about the technical science behind it, but those lenses really have a small depth of field! I had a WeeFine wet lens for testing and had the same effect, which for me did defy the whole purpose of the concept back then (could not zoom with that lens, so got not more flexibility). But it was great for CWFA, you could really get very close. Because of using a "normal" lens and then the wetlens, the distance between you as a diver and the subject is bigger than with a fisheye and skittish subjects allowed me to get much closer than with a fisheye and a small dome. But I did't like the small depth of field (even if not shooting CFWA). The pictures with the WeeFine did not just look as good as with a regular fisheye lens to me. But it is a different lens and different price point! Nicolas Remy made the same experience with the FCP: https://www.divephotoguide.com/underwater-photography-special-features/article/review-nauticam-fisheye-conversion-port-fcp-1 So I think the FCP is all about flexibility, it will not give you any advantage in allowing you to shoot wider apertures. For a normal fisheye lens I usually use f13 too.